Nothing is so galling to a people not broken in from the birth as a paternal, or in other words a meddling government, a government which tells them what to read and say and eat and drink and wear. – Thomas Babington, Lord Macaulay
My friend Philippa had a gift for coming up with memorable phrases, two of which I’ve used as the titles of previous columns (“Good Fantasy, Bad Reality” and “No Fun Shall Be Had”). “The enlightenment police” was her term for, as I stated in my August 30th column, “people who think their ideas about proper living need to apply to everyone else’s personal preferences.” The “enlightenment police” differ from plain old garden-variety moralistic busybodies chiefly in their rhetoric, which eschews traditional terms like “sin” and “salvation” in favor of terms like “oppression” and “empowerment”. But they are exactly like other moralists in their absolute faith in their own righteousness, their infantilization of adults who have beliefs which disagree with theirs and their willingness to “rescue” others at the point of a gun.
One of the interesting things about tyranny is the way it creates empathy between groups who might otherwise have nothing to do with one another. It would be difficult to conceive of two kinds of women who were farther apart on the modesty scale than whores and Muslim women who observe hijab, yet we are both targeted by “enlightenment police” armed with neofeminist rhetoric who are willing to deny our rights, to rob us of agency and to oppress us in the name of “freeing” us from “male oppression” no matter what we might want for ourselves. And because of that, the struggles and statements of the French Muslim women from this story in the Guardian of September 19th may seem eerily familiar to prostitutes and those who support our rights:
…In April, France introduced a law…[banning] Muslim women in full-face veils, or niqab…from any public activity including walking down the street, taking a bus, going to the shops or collecting their children from school. French politicians in favour of the ban said they were acting to protect the “gender equality” and “dignity” of women. But five months after the law was introduced, the result is a mixture of confusion and apathy. Muslim groups report a worrying increase in discrimination and verbal and physical violence against women in veils. There have been instances of people in the street taking the law into their hands and trying to rip off full-face veils, of bus drivers refusing to carry women in niqab or of shop-owners trying to bar entry. A few women have taken to wearing bird-flu-style medical masks to keep their faces covered; some describe a climate of divisiveness, mistrust and fear. One politician who backed the law said that women still going out in niqab were simply being “provocative”.
[Hind] Ahmas…was attacked in the street [by] a man and woman…[who] called her a whore and told her to go back to Afghanistan. “My quality of life has seriously deteriorated since the ban. In my head, I have to prepare for war every time I step outside, prepare to come up against people who want to put a bullet in my head. The politicians claimed they were liberating us; what they’ve done is to exclude us from the social sphere. Before this law, I never asked myself whether I’d be able to make it to a cafe or collect documents from a town hall. One politician in favour of the ban said niqabs were ‘walking prisons’. Well, that’s exactly where we’ve been stuck by this law.” But despite all the fanfare surrounding the niqab ban, no woman has yet been punished under the law for wearing one. The first real test will come on Thursday [September 22nd], when a local judge in Meaux, east of Paris, will decide whether to hand out to Ahmas and a friend the first ever fine. [As this follow-up explains, they were fined €120 and €80 respectively and will immediately appeal to France’s supreme court]…Now, human rights lawyers are suggesting it could soon be overturned.
Only the French police can [legally] confront a woman in niqab. They can’t remove her veil but must refer the case to a local judge, who can hand out a…fine, a citizenship course, or both. Some police have wrongly given on-the-spot fines, which were later annulled. Others appear to ignore women in niqab walking down the street, perhaps because they feel they have more important crimes to be stopping. The interior ministry says that since the law came into force in April there have been 91 incidents of women in niqab being stopped by police outside Paris and nine incidents in the Paris region…The French justice ministry says “fewer than 10” cases are currently going through the courts and the lack of fines shows the state favours “dialogue” not punishment. But Gilles Devers, a lawyer acting for Ahmas and several other women in niqab, argued punishments were not being handed out because the niqab law contravenes European human rights legislation on personal liberties and freedom of religion. As soon as a fine is imposed, there will be an appeal right up to the European court of human rights in Strasbourg, which could rule against the law and expose the French state as a laughing stock.
If the French law is challenged in this way, the result would be crucial for Muslims across the continent. Belgium introduced its own niqab ban this summer, punishable not just by a fine but seven days in prison. In Italy, the far-right Northern League has resuscitated a 1975 law against face coverings to fine women in certain areas of the north. Silvio Berlusconi’s party is now preparing an anti-niqab law. Denmark is preparing legislation to limit the wearing of niqabs; politicians in Austria, the Netherlands and Switzerland are pushing for outright bans. Thomas Hammarberg, the Council of Europe’s commissioner for human rights, blogged this summer: “The way the dress of a small number of women has been portrayed as a key problem requiring urgent discussion and legislation is a sad capitulation to the prejudices of the xenophobes.”
…There are no reliable statistics on who wears the niqab in France and whether they have kept wearing it since the law. It is estimated that only a few hundred women wear it, mostly French citizens. Muslim associations say a minority of women have taken off the niqab or moved abroad…An Open Society Foundation report on women in niqabs in France…found that of a sample of 32 women in niqab, none had been forced to wear the full veil. Many said they would refuse to take if off after the law came in, adding that they would avoid leaving home, or move abroad…
A few hundred women, yet they’ve managed to back the French government against the wall and may yet defeat its attempt to control them. There are almost 450,000 of us; why can’t we do the same? We need to expose the “enlightenment police” for what they are: busybody control freaks who don’t give a damn about women’s dignity, but are happy to use it as an excuse for oppression.
One Year Ago Today
“Who Did Your Tits?” tells the story of how and why I went from not-quite-A to DDD, and how it affected my life.
The whole niqab affair was/is a sorry episode as it’s brought out all the Geert Wilder worshipers screaming “Islamofacism!!!” without seeing the irony.
As an Englishman I really am surprised that the French have stooped to such depths.
I’m not surprised; the French has a very long history of saying “do it our way or else” under the excuse of “Liberté, égalité, fraternité”.
And whats wrong with that? I am not a fan of the french by any means. But it is their country, why should they have to change?
Because the “or else” usually means consequences out of proportion to the offense. You’re right, it’s their country, but if they didn’t want foreigners in it they should make it harder to immigrate. Of course, they can’t do that because like every other Western culture they’re not bothering to replace themselves, and unless they start doing so (and it may already be too late), no number of laws will stop the inevitable.
And that goes for the rest of Europe, and the U.S. as well (though we are just barely at replacement level – for now).
I usually agree with everything you write. But i think youre off on this one. Wanting foreigners is not the same as wanting foreign culture to take over the workings of the foreign culture. I dont care how many muslims, japanese, germans, or maori come to the US, but it doesnt mean the US should accept sharia law, be run by an emporer, have socialized medicine, or have a tribal form of government. People need to assimilate into the culture of the country they moved to, not the other way around.
That’s not my point. A woman “should” be able to get drunk, strip all her clothes off and not get raped, but that’s highly unrealistic. And it’s just as unrealistic to think that if the natives in any country refuse to reproduce themselves at replacement levels but allow enough foreigners in to make up the numbers, that their culture will remain unchanged.
An organism has to do certain things (eat, exercise, defend itself, etc) to stay alive, and so does a culture, and none of the Western nations are doing what it takes.
But france has one of the highest fertility rates in europe, and restricts immigration more than germany. Idk, it seems to me that the vocal minority is pushing the silent majority to change. 5% to 10% of the population pushing its beliefs on the remaining 90% to 95%.
That’s like saying Mt. Driskill is the highest mountain in Louisiana; it’s factually true but doesn’t mean beans. The ethnic French birth rate (not simply the birth rate for citizens of France) is still below replacement levels; it’s just not as far below as Germany. And once the ethnic French population becomes the minority (in under at century at current rates of change) no number of laws against veils or anything else will keep France French.
White Europeans (and to a slightly lesser extent white Americans) are headed for extinction and will inevitably be replaced by brown people who don’t feel they have to be ashamed of their history and culture and reproduce prolifically.
To which I’d say, “so what?”
Anyway, as the brown people in question become more affluent, they’ll reproduce at a slower rate too.
I agree about “so what”, but the people whose culture will be replaced seem plenty worried. I tend to take a more pragmatic view of such things; everything lives and dies, including cultures, worlds and stars.
‘But it is their country, why should they have to change?’
That’s just the problem, where do we draw the line? Do we turn a blind eye at Uganda for arresting homosexuals?
Suppose Germany tomorrow passed a law banning women from driving when a majority of Germans want the law, do we turn a blind eye at that because “it’s their country.”
Another thing about France is that they were/are the founding members of the EU which requires them to uphold its ideals and that includes the Human Rights Act which was written after WW2 to prevent things like this from happening. If the French ignore the summons by Strausbourg it will undermine everything the EU stands for and show the rest of the world that the French operate on “do as we say, not do as we do.”
Countries already turn a blind eye.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/saudiarabia/8795748/Saudi-king-saves-woman-driver-from-10-lashes.html
http://thriftytraveling.com/going-to-dubai-better-know-the-law/
http://www.newswithviews.com/fredinburg/fredinburg129.htm
Those are non-euro countries. You’ve just proven my point.
Actually it seems like its ok to turn a blind eye when its not an eu country. Doesnt the human rights act apply to men raping young boys? Or is it ok to be more outraged about making someone take their veil off, than about forcible rape?
the law has to do with xenophobia,not with concern about womens rights,the governments that suppport the ban are known for their hostile policies towards immigrants,sarkozy and berlusconi especially seem to despise them,the people of netherlands and denmark are extremely xenophobic as well.the amount of money that they are required to pay is absurd as well,120 euros, for often poor immigrants.i think anti prostitution policies and attitudes have often to do with xenophobia as well,in europe at least,since many of the sex workers are immigrants.first, it is often assumed that because they are immigrants they are trafficked,people socially isolate them even more than they would if they were local prostitutes,because ”those russian whores come here and steal our husbands,they and their filth should be deported back”,and of course those ”feminist politicians”despise them as well,because there are even more prostitutes in the country now,so they wear their ”caring” smile,the one that politicians are known for,and declare them victims and try to help them by making their lives more difficult than they already are by their ”protecting laws”.you know,if those women that cover their faces wanted tyrannical governments and being afraid of leaving their house,thay might as well have stayed in afganistan and when women(and people in general) who try to make a living in a foreigh country, have to be subjected to unbeleivable govenment induced problems and complications while trying to establish better lives and not starve to death,it means that you are not as ”european”or ”humanitarian”as you claim to be,you are no better than the governments they escaped from.
Precisely.
I’m not really surprised. I agree wholeheartedly that these “Enlightenment Police” and their minions don’t know how to leave well enough alone from whatever country they come from. They may be different on what rules they enforce, but it stems from the same desire of doing what I told you to do because I know how everyone should live.
In addition to this, what you are finding is diversity plus poximity equals war. France like all Western Countries especially the USA has made the mistake of invade the world, invite the world in and be in debt to the rest of the world. Things have played out a little differently in each country, but the basic plot has remained the same. As a veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan, I ran across many soldiers from differing Western Countries. I certainly ran across French soldiers in Afghanistan. Many soldiers end up despising the people of the country they were at war in so I’m not surprised by the comments. My point is that France would have difficulty assimilating Americans or Irish or Polish or Italains or Spanish or other Westerners. What made them think they would be able to assimilate the Muslim Southwest Asians e.g.. Iraqis or the Muslim Central Asians e.g. Afghans?
Afghans and Pakistanis can have some very strange and horrifying ideas about justice and law to us Westerners. Most of you probabaly heard about the case of a Pakistani woman who was raped by another families males because her brother said something rude to these male’s female member. The only reason it got play in the USA is because of the Feminists have extaordinary power in our culture. I remeber getting ready for the Afghanistan deployment as I has already been to Iraq before. Brand new soldiers were asking me about my experiences in Iraq. I told them, but stated that Afgahnistan was a whole different war and country than Iraq, and that I needed to not apply to many of my experiences of Iraq to Afghanistan and that it would be better to go to an Afghanistan veteran which I was not at the time for advice. a female soldier stepped in and told them what her previous deployment was like. She told them of how she was in a guard tower at night and she saw a grown 30 year old man anally raping a six year old boy through her night vision goggles while in Afghanistan. She called it in in order to get the police to arrest him or at least be given permission to take a shot at him to scare him away. Neither was allowed to happen. It seems that a twenty year old male cousin to the six year old boy had disrespected a twenty year old female sister of the thirty year old man. The rules of engagement are so restrictive and crazy,in Afghanistan, I don’t even want to talk about it.Needless to say, we were all horrified. My opinion is noone would care even if this news leaked out because well, he’s a male even if a six year old male at the time. Afghanistan is rife with prepubescent boys being used as sex toys for men. I remember going outside installation to pick up the food trucks for the chow hall, and seeing elementary school boys who seemed to be apprenticed to the truch drivers ground guiding the trucks instead of being in school. Iraq has a 70% literacy rate and Afghanistan has a 30% literacy rate. I have nothing against the Muslim Central Asians or Soutt west Asians, but I don’t want them in my country, and the sooner we pull our armed forces out the better. The Christians of Iraq may be ok as immigrants, but there will be a tremendous adjustment for them as they are way more conservative and tribal in some respects than us Christians here in the USA.
A few hundred women, yet they’ve managed to back the French government against the wall and may yet defeat its attempt to control them. There are almost 450,000 of us; why can’t we do the same?
Becuase Europe and Americas fatal obbsession with cultural relativism is all the rage these days.
Now while this law does have problems I have to say given the track record over the last 1500 yrs of what happens to a country/culture when muslims become the majority I dont blame the French for trying to break Islam and shove it into the same small constrained space we’ve managed to do with christianity
i think these are very good laws. Islam is a serious threat to European civilization.
How would you feel if people said YOUR beliefs were a threat to European civilization? Just wondering.
I think that there is more to it. There is a safety issue or perceived safety issue with having masked people wandering the streets.
More likely is that the french dont like how this group has not assimilated to the french way.
IMHO, people need to assimilate to the country they moved to.
Yes, me, but its also about makeing the effing religion subservient to secular scociety, I’ve seen articles detailing entire neihborhoods shut down as they drop in the middle of the streets and sidewalks to pray
No religion is obligated to be “subservient to the secular society” anymore than secular society is obligated to be subservient to religion.
lujlp, if it bothers you that in Muslim neighborhoods “entire neihborhoods shut down as they drop in the middle of the streets and sidewalks to pray”, that’s your problem. There is no law against public prayer or synchronized prayer.
Dear Marla, YES! Thank you and bless you!
Really, so you are fine with witch burnings and torturing heretics into recanting?
Because thats what happens when religion is not kept in its place
lujlp, you are equating religious FREEDOM (including public prayer and synchronized prayer) with state-enforced religion (burning witches and torturing heretics into recanting). That’s a totally dishonest equation. It should be obvious to you that since America became the United States, there has generally been religious freedom, but no more Salem Witch Trials and no Inquisition.
No, marla I am not making a dishonest equasion, I was pointing out what happens when a religion is not kept below the level of secular law.
You are the one that said, and I quote, “No religion is obligated to be “subservient to the secular society””
In a free and open society religon must be kept constrained. And this law, stupid and pointless as it is(the ‘offical’ justification even moreso), is french scociety reacting to a perceived threat to that constraint.
I dont think it was the right way to go about it, but with muslims just accross the channel calling for exemtion from englands civil law and sharia law zones, I cant say I blame the for trying to do something to preserve their culture
Religion does not have to be “kept below the level of secular law”; each has its own proper sphere of influence. Law is a matter of physical force and should be used only to safeguard human rights. Religion is a matter of private, voluntary faith and conscience. My Christian practices do not have to be “kept below” or “made subservient to” secular law; secular law only assures that I cannot force my Christian practices on other unwilling people, not that I can’t choose them FOR MYSELF.
You are pretending there is no difference between an individual or group of individuals choosing to engage in their religious practices, and the government FORCING unwilling people to engage in religious practices. Totally dishonest equation, like I said.
No Marla it isnt, you assume that your fellow believers would never go back to murder and torture or force their values on others. BUt look at the very blog we are on
Prostituion is illegal for no other reason then it offnends the morals of the religious majority. Until the upreme courts struck down the Texas sodomy laws blowjobs, handjobs, and masterbation between MARRIED couples were illegal in nearly every state. As was non marital sex. Sure enforcemnt was lax and selective, but it was illegal none the less.
And these are just a few of the many the constriants your fellow belivers in a moralistic overlord impose on the rest of us. Can you imagine the feild day those kind of people would have if their actions were not constrined by civil law?
The truth is you dont have to imagine, you can crack open any history book to find out, or look at news out of any quasi theocratic state in the middle east.
Its not a dishonest equasion, it is the cold hard truth – if your self idenity werent so dependant on the illusion that your god is the source of your morality youd be able to see that any religion unchecked by a non religious power spawns nothing but monsters so convinced of their own good that no act, no matter how depraved or horrifying, would ever be too far in dealing with no believers
lujlp, there is a HUGE difference between individual religious FREEDOM and state-imposed religious ENFORCEMENT. No, freedom of religion, freedom to express one’s religious beliefs in any non-coercive way one chooses, does not lead to tortures, inquisitions, or any of the other scenarios you warn of; 235 years of United States history proves that. In countries where those horrors happened, THEY DIDN’T HAVE FREEDOM OF RELIGION. Do you understand that the Spanish Inquisition happened in a country that didn’t have freedom of religion – not because religion wasn’t constrained, but because freedom of religion WAS constrained?
Is this too complicated for you to understand? Maybe it is.
You are ill-informed about American sex laws before Lawrence vs Texas; that ruling struck down such laws in the minority of states that still had them, and most states had already repealed those laws.
Prostitution is illegal in America because American women perceive it as a threat to wives’ power over their husbands. Many of the most fanatical anti-prostitution people are non-religious, like Melissa Farley. It should tell you something that AFAIK prostitution has been illegal in virtually every communist country, and they’re officially atheist.
Marla, what do you suppose sharia law is? If you werent aware it is RELIGIOUS law. DO you not understand that when, in polls, muslims are asked if theyed prefer sharia law over the secular laws of their adopted countries a large number of them say yes.
They are openly endorsing the subtritution of secular laws in favor of the religious laws in the koran – how is freedom of religion to survive under a system which fines, and penalises anyone who chooses the ‘wrong’ religion?
The reason that this country and so many in europe enjoy freedom of religion is becuase religion is kept in its place. That is my argumnet. I think that in trying so hard to win this debate you twisted yourself around and inadvertantly started using the same points I was
And I am very familliar with the sex laws in the US.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Map_of_US_sodomy_laws.svg
And given the recent spate of pharmicists refusing to fill birth control and morning after pill subscriptions on ‘moral’ grounds I’d make the argument that religious exception to secular law is still at levels too high for comfort
The next step is facial feature recognition devices all over the place, so anyone whom the government issues a warrant for can be picked up within hours unless he’s out in the boonies somewhere. For our safety, of course. Even better: DNA taken from each child at birth and stored just in case he commits a “crime” in 20 or 30 years.
Maybe you want to live in a world where paranoid ideas of “safety” (which just happen to enable tyranny as well) take precedence over an individual’s right to do as she pleases as long as no one is hurt, but I don’t.
Unfortunately i believe that the facial recognition software is already being used, and probably more in the uk than anywhere else.
As i tried to say, i think it is more push back because they have not assimilated in to the french way of life.
While I understand Maggie’s concern about facial recognition software (And I hate how they’ve got cameras everywhere in the UK) and agree in general concept with the idea of the enlightenment police, I disagree strongly with the particulars.
I’d think the Enlightenment police would be on the opposite side on this one: They’d probably be trying to shove the idea of letting muslim immigrants do as they bloody well please down our throats.
Look, across Europe the typical style of Islam has become pretty much the stereotype, and justly earned, of violent terrorism. Generally, people don’t like foreigners who flood in, refuse to assimilate, demand to keep their own laws, and riot and blow up the bus you’re riding on. So yes, there’s been some blow back from all that.
Islam, the “religion” of peace has left bloody tracks across parts of Europe before. It’s a religion that treats women, gays and lesbians terribly. If it disappeared from human culture tomorrow I’d say good riddance to bad rubbish. So don’t expect me to get get worked up about France forbidding the beekeeper suit for women.
The problem is, infringements of civil liberties ALWAYS start with one unpopular group, then once the legal precedent is established it just keeps going. In the United States everybody thought the idea of putting all the “violent sex offenders” on a list forever was a peachy idea…until they discovered that the government was adding mostly 18-year-olds who screwed their 15-year-old girlfriends or guys who pee in public. And everyone thought that it was a simply super idea to give the cops the power to break down doors without warning to get “terrorists”; since 2006, those powers have been used against suspected terrorists 15 times; against people accused of fraud 122 times, and against people suspected of drug possession 1618 times.
I don’t trust giving the government ANY power it doesn’t absolutely, positively need, because such powers never, never, NEVER stay limited to whatever it was that they were supposed to be used for. And then the djinni is out of the bottle and won’t ever go back in.
>”until they discovered that the government was adding mostly 18-year-olds who screwed their 5-year-old girlfriends”
I’m all in favor of putting those guys on a list. But I think you mean 15 year old girlfriends.
And there’s a vast gulf between making a law saying you can’t go around in public with your face covered and cops breaking in doors. (Although I agree, never trust a cop with more power than deciding between sugared and glazed…)
If I decided that I waned to wear a balaclava all the time, well, certainly in public that might make people very nervous. On mass transit it might cause terror. I probably wouldn’t be allowed in banks or government buildings.
So why should the principle not apply if some superstition decides it’s part of their tradition?
Yikes! Yes, I did mean 15, and I fixed it. 😉
I’ll back you up on this, Maggie. They are letting these immigrants in so it’s easier to break our liberty. Japan, Taiwan and South Korea appears to be better off because immigration there is low and racial and cultural homogeneity high. What people seem to forget is that South Korea, Japan and Taiwan have these things not so much because of laws and their enforcement, but because of social norms and cohesion. They don’t murder as much because noone wants to live in a screwed up society. Laws never mean as much as social convention and we in the West particualrly in the USA have forgotten that. As a side note, Taiwan has legalized prostitution, but has not yet worked out how the details of that will work out. If Taiwan was a multi-cultural or multi racial society, it woiuld have been less likely to happen. Racially and culturally homogeneous societies tend to have more libertry. Even our founding fathers knew this and the idea of a pure proposition nation is a false one and it is not the only reason we are losing our liberty, but it surely is one of them. Why do you think one of the reasons Iraq and Afghanistan are a mess? When the money is gone we have less in the USA to keep us together and away from choking eachother out than these countries do simply because they are racially and culturally more cohesive than we are in the West particularly the USA. I wish no evil upon someone of a different race or culture, and even ethnicity of the same race is still racial, but I recognize what a buch of tribal or clannish fools we are especially when the money is gone. The only thing Iraq and Afghanistan have to unite them is Islam and “democracy” may help but it’s going to be a an authoritarian Islamic democracy.which they already are. Trust me, Ilived it in Iraq and Afghanistan. Try converting to Christianity in afghanistan and see what happens. It’s against the law. In Iraq, it’s not agaisnt the law, but noone will defend you or your life in practice or reality. Even the USA had more of decriminalization of prostitution in the 19th century when the country was more Christian and White especially Northwestern European and Protestant than it is now is yet one more example of how we were more free back then. I say this as a White person of Catholic heritage.
doclove wrote: “Racially and culturally homogeneous societies tend to have more libertry… Even the USA had more of decriminalization of prostitution in the 19th century when the country was more Christian and White especially Northwestern European and Protestant than it is now is yet one more example of how we were more free back then.”
Most racially and culturally homogeneous countries have little freedom; such homogeneity is the basis of theocracy, and exists in the majority of communist countries.
As for the idea that “we were more free back then” in the first half of the 19th century when prostitution was mostly ignored by the U.S. government, no, we weren’t. Many Americans were literal slaves then. Only a minority of the population was allowed to vote (land-owning white males). Married women were not allowed to own land or any property; all they had became their husband’s property, thus forcing women to choose between a form of marriage that was essentially indentured servitude, and staying single at a time when women had very few decent-paying career options outside of prostitution. So no, I don’t think America was freer in the early 19th century.
Putting “violent sex offenders” on a list is a good idea. Its the rest of the stuff that was added thats the problem. Youre right, adding people who pee in public, and 18 year olds who had sex with their 17 year old lovers is insane.
The problem is that it’s always a segway into taking more liberty away from people and destroying their lives. Then they can never escape. It would have better not to have these laws at all.
Is it? Then why aren’t violent non-sex offenders on a list as well? Are people who rape more dangerous than those who torture and kill, or shoot people for their tennis shoes? Sex criminals have a LOWER rate of recidivism than other criminals, so why do we have these lists for comparatively lesser threats but not comparatively greater ones? And what about the fact that social isolation such as these lists create makes it MORE likely that someone so punished will re-offend, not less? It’s all about sex stigma, not safety.
I agree with you Maggie, we should be doing the same for all violent offenders. There is no doubt that the sex stigma has something to do with it. The devil is always in the details. I could care less about a couple who got caugut having sex in a car in some dark alley. I do care about someone who has been physically violent.
Would you agree with a list of all violent offenders?
Nope. Such registries make every sentence into a life sentence, and socially isolate those on them, cutting them off from normal jobs, residence and social interaction and making it much more likely they will re-offend. If people would just learn to take responsibility for their own protection rather than expecting the State to protect them, there would be neither need nor support for such blacklists.
Thank you, Maggie!
Anytime the law makes it impossible for former convicts to re-enter normal society, all they do is create a class of permanant criminals. Just look at how many lives have been ruined just with ordinary criminal records. A publicised registry such as that for ‘sex offenders’ is far worse.
Maggie wrote: “Sex criminals have a LOWER rate of recidivism than other criminals…”
Sex criminals’ RECIDIVISM rate is different from their ADDITIONAL CONVICTION rate. The majority of sex crimes against adults go unreported, and the vast majority of sex crimes against children go unreported. Even when sex crimes are reported, only 5 percent of reported rapes in Americda result in a conviction. It’s dishonest to claim that only a small percentage of sex criminals re-offend because only a small percentage are re-convicted. Maggie, you have been raped three times and never reported any of those rapes; according to your disingenuous logic here, your rapists are innocent because they didn’t get convicted.
Dear Marla, thanks for speaking up on this. The information you’ve found on this confirms what I’ve found also online and off. Unfortunately, there’s also unreported murders (talk about an outrage that should never happen!).
That’s true, but the facts remain that A) most sex crimes are committed by people known to the victim, not strangers on a registry; B) the registries don’t work; C) they set a dangerous precedent; and D) they create a permanent criminal underclass without hope of reform or rehabilitation.
It’s important to know that at least some family members and/or friends of violent and non-violent criminals don’t want their family member and/or friend out of prison. It’s a very popular myth that all or even most of these people want their loved 1 free, try to get them out of charges, are in complete and wilfull denial of what the person has done, etc. Thanks for listening.
http://www.pomc.com/killeralert.cfm -the wonderful group Parents of Murdered Children keeps this list of murderers who have either been released from prison early or paroled. They also post and put out parole protest petitions that can and do work (thank God!). People can also get in touch with the parole board that’s dealing with the perpetrator in their case in order to keep up with their status, questions about possible release dates, etc. This doesn’t apply to just murder cases.
Am I the only shocked, and somewhat sickened, by the level of anti-Islamic bigotry in the comments today?
I dont know? Arent you shocked by how every culture subsumed by Islam pluments into the bronze age?
Really? Why was it then while under Saddam Hussein who separated church and state that rock music was played on the radio, “Playboy” magazine was for sale in the open, women didn’t have to cover if they didn’t want to, many women were going to college, etc.? Why was that? And for SOME reason (eyeroll) the people in this part of the world literally invented at least 1 form of math? Those dumb camel jockeys? Say it isn’t so! Those ragheads? No way! What’s not getting talked about here is that when you have non-church state separation no matter what religion and/or belief system is predominant evil results. Many Muslims are working for reform including to break the women can’t drive ban in Saudi Arabia. Please know I’m not saying Saddam was some great leader. But, the fact that some things did change for the better (like the examples above) shows that separation of church/state is needed for as much freedom as possible. This is 1 reason I’m a Protestant because Martin Luther knew this and exposed it constantly.
Thanks, Laura. The reason I haven’t said much is because I wanted to read all the comments and see if anybody beat me to it. You and Ornithothynchus did, and I thank both of you.
Yes, the problem is theocracy, not Islam. A Christian theocracy or even a Jain theocracy would be just as big a problem as an Islamic theocracy.
Ofcourse theocracy is the problem, but most christians dont want to live in a theorcacy, according to polls a far larger number of muslims do – and there is a reason such countries are not torist hot spots no matter how beautiful the countryside is or how rich the cultural history was befor islam consumed it.
Have you seen the reports out of egypt? Muslims are calling for the pyramids to be shut down to the tourists and archeologists, and for the sphinx to be hidden away from sight
At least some of the Muslims don’t want the pyramids shut down. But, your pattern is to never point out the positives! Yes, people on here know there’s people of ALL belief systems who literally want things shut down, order people around, etc. Focusing so strongly on the Muslims is, unfortunately, greatly accepted now in the US and also reveled in (seen as tough, “with it”, etc.) since 9/11. Speaking of tourism, why is Dubai called by many “the shopping capital of the Middle East” (per Wikipedia article on Dubai tourism)? Also, many people still visit Israel despite how many terrorist things have happened there and they have to go through the most secure airport in the world to get there.
Its not my job to highlight every facet of every argument, if it was every comment would be dozens of paragraphs.
As for people visiting Isreal, that probaly has soething to do with the fact that Isrealies dont beat people in the street and imprison them for years for being a woman in the presence of men.
And the only reason Isreal has the most secure airport in the world is beacuse of terrorism. And it isnt terrorism commited by jews if you werent aware.
Believe it or not, I was aware! WOW! Yes, a big reason for the airport security is because of how many attacks there’s been. The truth is, though, that there’s been terrorist attacks done by Israeli people also. Like Sailor Barsoom has said on here, there’s terrorists of all of races, religions, belief systems, etc. This includes some Muslims. Please note it’s a small # of them along with ALL the others who have done terrorism also. It’s an “easy way out” to demonize all or even most Muslims because of a few who are ###*** terrorists. It’s the easiest way of thinking and it’s very destructive, cruel and arrogant.
Slight difference being when a christain bombs an abortion clinic most christians public condem such an action. I seem to remember news video of large crowds of people celebrating terrorist acts commited by muslims
You wilfully ignore that there’s several groups of Muslims working for reform and these groups include MEN. But, I thought all the men are rapists? That they all think women give off “sex rays” (eyeroll) and that’s the ONLY reason they cover? No way could it have to do with the woman actually WANTING to cover, could it? NO WAY! That would be a POSITIVE and we can’t have those! We have to stick with the constant negativity, stereotyping, etc. I posted an article in this thread that talks about Muslims speaking out against what happened on 9/11. It also points out that there were some Muslims killed in the 9/11 attacks also that were among the victims in New York City and NOT any of the 1’s who hijacked the planes. As far as those “cheering” videos go, I’ve learned 1 of them was staged.
I can believe that I misspelled “Ornithorynchus, ” but it’s weird that I made that particular mistake.
Perhaps you are unaware but Saddam was a tyranical dictator who did what ever he felt like, Sharia law was not the asis for secular law under Saddam’s regime
Please note I said above that I know Saddam wasn’t overall a great leader. Overall he was an ###*** psychopath who caused a lot of HELL for too many. But, I give credit where it’s due in that he (Saddam) did have the church/state separation and some things in THAT area WERE better under him.
And there was electricity.
Yes, thank you! The electricity deserves a mention. Since the US invaded Iraq, they’ve had an overall horrible time with electricity services which is disgusting. What an irony that this was better under Saddam!
You may want to read about Malcolm X who turned from racism and was also a Muslim at the time he changed. He did a TON of good and I’m convinced he was killed by ###*** that hated him from turning from racism (along with other reasons).
Acctually he was killed on orders of the leadership of the Nation of Islam after his return from a pilgramige to the middle east and his public statements to american muslims to wake up and stop blindly following the religion, and the leadership and to start thinking for themselves.
He was one of the few muslims who turned away from racism, seperatism, blind obedience to leadership, and a blind faith in the faith of Islam and he was murdered for it
lujlp, Malcolm X turned against the Nation of Islam leadership because they were preaching their own theology in which White people were “blue eyed devils”, and after he visited Saudi Arabia and started learning more about Islam, he realized that the Nation of Islam leadership was preaching their own nonsense that had nothing to do with actual Islam. You claim Malcolm X told American Muslims to “wake up and stop blindly following the religion”, but in fact, what he told them to wake up and stop blindly following was the ridiculous Nation of Islam ideology which had no basis in the Koran.
I have problems with Islam for other reasons, but you’re distorting Islam here.
Islam isn’t for me either (for many reasons), but this distorting you’re talking about is just so accepted now in the US after 9/11 it’s disgusting. Here’s an example of what the good Muslims have been put through since 9/11: http://www.poconorecord.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110912/NEWS/109120321/-1/rss01 This article also points out that some Muslim people were also killed in the 9/11 attacks.
You don’t think there was some US government involvement in his death? By this I mean some in government, NOT ALL. The truth is there’s always been decent people in US government who don’t go along with evil but expose it instead. Thank God for them. I’m personally convinced there were more factors in Malcolm’s death than just the Nation of Islam.
Yep, and members of the nation of Islam’s leadership bragging about it is of no importance whatsoever
She didn’t say the NoI wasn’t involved at all. She said she was personally convinced that they weren’t the only ones.
I’m not so convinced, but I’ll confine myself to addressing arguments actually made.
Dear Sailor B, I can show you some websites that list evidence for some US government involvement in Malcolm X’s death. THANK YOU for standing up for me. I’m sick and tired of ###*** being projected on those who won’t have any part of the Muslim HATE that’s become not only popular but promoted, seen as “strength” (God help us) and accepted since 9/11 in the US. It was also around before that (isn’t that WONDERFUL?), but since 9/11 it’s a lot worse.
I’d like to see that as well, becuase I find it odd the the government would kill a man (not that I have any problem beliving that the governemt would kill someone) AFTER he stopped calling for segregation, rebellion, and black supremecy and became more moderate and called for black muslims to drop the hatred.
And personally I wont have part of any ideology that calls for my subjigation and murder for not beleiving in their particular sky fairy.
I NEVER said this and you know it. Yes, some in Nation of Islam were involved. Just because someone says she’s convinced there was ALSO involvement by others BESIDES this doesn’t automatically rule out the involvement of ANOTHER group.
Above was to lujlp, not to Sailor B.
Not really.
What we’re seeing is a classic example of ‘cutting off your nose to spite your own face’ all in the name of preventing civil liberties.
Along with tactlessness, closed-mindedness, stereotyping, blanket statements and willfully ignoring the many Muslims who don’t fit this ###*** and are also working for reform within Islam. Since 9/11 it’s a tragedy how this is not only accepted by many, it’s literally reveled in and seen as “strength” and “we’re so tough and above those ###*** Muslims”. Really? That’s the same mentality that those who think that any criminal should be beat up/killed and/or tortured without a trial 1st. Let’s show that criminal how superior we are! How tough we are! Let’s do violent acts to a violent criminal! ###*** trials! The violent form of justice is the way to go! Funny how doing violence to a criminal without a trial is OK, but the violence done by the criminal isn’t. Living in glass houses anyone? Doing violence yourself against the violent 1? And thinking you’re the superior 1? RIGHT!
Dear ornithorhynchus, I’m not shocked at all. It’s happened on here before. Isn’t that WONDERFUL? A few months ago it was several posts about how Mohammed was REALLY a pervert. I was going to speak against that, but Sailor Barsoom beat me to it (thank God he spoke out!). Actually, I think now I should have joined in with Sailor B. on that 1 despite the limited time I have to spend online (unfortunately). On the “pervert” issue, even Muslim scholars are divided on it. There’s no consensus on it with them. I know any of us on here COULD say a lot of things. Examples: Jesus was a hook-nosed Jew who was a miser. Buddha was a slant-eyed creep who loved setting off firecrackers and was obsessed with dragons. Aleister Crowley REALLY DID sacrifice young, smart, perfect boys of a certain age. L. Ron Hubbard was as clueless and plain stupid about everything just LIKE ALL HIS FOLLOWERS HAVE BEEN AND STILL ARE! WOW! Did I leave out any group? Those who belong to any of these groups do you feel better now? A while back on here I had great fun writing up a list of those WONDERFUL, FAIR stereotypes, etc., about Christians. I did that for my own amusement plus to make some points using sarcastic humor. It’s really tragic these days that this ###*** is seen as STRENGTH, as FUNNY and as “WITH IT”. We’re oh so cynical and oh so TOUGH! We’re so above those horrible Muslims and every other group we tactlessly trash, patronize and put in those wonderful safe, little category boxes. I made that phrase up not long after I got involved in the debate over the death penalty in regards to murder cases online. That was a big education in much of the same ###*** as the Muslims get, but just with a different set of people. And those Muslims: nearly all of them are terrorists! If you live around them LONG ENOUGH, you’ll SEE HOW THEY REALLY ARE! Most if not all of the Muslim men are rapists! The women don’t even KNOW why they cover since Islam like every religion that’s hated and trashed it’s designed to keep them ignorant of everything, STUPID and just be mindless robot slaves! Yes, the Muslims are going to kill everyone in France, every other country in Europe, and then kill tons of people in the US! We have to be on “terror alerts” all the time since 9/11 in the US because of those horrible Muslims! Let’s laugh at those WONDERFUL Danish cartoons (like the 1 with Mohammed with his turban as a bomb) and never say a word about how TACTLESS and cruel they are to begin with! Can’t have that! I mean, Laura right now is judging everyone with words and paragraphs of DOOM, isn’t she? How dare she? She’s having those “hysterics” AGAIN! OK, am done with the above to make my point and I THANK YOU Ornithorhynchus for being sickened by this stuff (I am also and am so tired of seeing it nearly everywhere online). The TRUTH is there’s many Muslims who have never been terrorists and/or rapists and that many of the women LIKE to cover and know WHY they do and to say they can’t is plain old EVIL RELIGIOUS PERSECUTION. Women who cover can safely drive and are willing to expose their faces to be identified (such as on the stand in a courtroom). If anyone wants them, I’d be glad to post links about the above. There’s at least a few groups (that include Muslim men) that are working very hard to REFORM Islam and fight the evil results of non-church state separation in the predominantly Muslim countries. There’s whole groups of women FIGHTING to BREAK the women can’t drive ban in Saudi Arabia also. You mean it isn’t all gloom and doom? Really? The truth is when you have non-church state separation with ANY religion and/or belief system INCLUDING atheism evil RESULTS. It doesn’t matter WHAT belief system it is. I had a dear male friend at work years ago who was a new Christian and was telling me he heard how “great” it would be for the US to have ALL Christians in political office. It was hard for me to stay calm to wait for him to be done speaking about this. I then calmly told him what happens when ANY religion/belief system (including atheism) isn’t separated from the government, etc. I gave examples from past history and also current 1’s. He was convinced from the examples of the danger of it. Thanks for listening.
A few months ago it was several posts about how Mohammed was REALLY a pervert.
Well, he did marry a six year old and fuck her before she turned ten. And as a way to avoid beatings and execution for the high crime of being a woman in the company of an unrelated man he instituted a policy of having the man in question suck on the womans nipples for a while
The women don’t even KNOW why they cover
Its to prevent the sex rays emminating from womens skin turnning innocent men into midless rapists incapable fo free will or ethical behavior
Let’s laugh at those WONDERFUL Danish cartoons
Or we could just kill the artists
(like the 1 with Mohammed with his turban as a bomb) and never say a word about how TACTLESS and cruel they are to begin with!
So just to be clear, freedom of speech is fine if its choosing to wear a tent, but saterical cartoons are verboten? And what of the artists punishment? Was that too a form of free speech you agree with?
There’s whole groups of women FIGHTING to BREAK the women can’t drive ban in Saudi Arabia also. You mean it isn’t all gloom and doom? Really?
I know did you see the youtube vidoe of the cops using bull whips to beat one of those protesters? In broad daylight? In the middle of the street?
Or the video of the woman being pepper sprayed on Wall Street. Asshole cops exist in most if not all countries, and in most if not all religions.
Saying that a cartoon is tasteless is not the same as saying the artist should be killed. Allowing a woman to were traditional dress is not the same as allowing her to stone a woman for adultery. This isn’t just apples and oranges, this is apples and rutabagas.
Not once did I say a word about killing any of those cartoonists! You can see something is in the POOREST TASTE POSSIBLE and at the same time be against killing the cartoonists! I never said there shouldn’t be cartoons in the worst taste possible. The truth is with TRUE freedom of speech people are going to have to “put up with” tasteless and tactless cartoons, articles, etc., etc. It’s how it is. We can choose to NOT buy the newspaper the cartoons are IN if we like but no way do I agree with the people who said the cartoonists should have been arrested, beaten up, etc. and I don’t appreciate that being projected on me either. As Sailor Barsoom has said, there’s (unfortunately) bad police in every country. And also unfair laws. I say instead of just saying “well, that’s how it is” and putting all the energy towards watching videos why not put at least some of the energy towards working for reform? As far as the “pervert” thing with Mohammed, I say again not even the Muslim scholars can agree on that issue so you can’t say for sure that he did have sex with her (her name was Aiyesha by the way…hope I’m spelling that right) or that he didn’t. Your reasons why the women cover aren’t complete and show the usual closed-minded cynicism (choosing to wear a tent).
So you think its in poor taste to point out the common motivatiing thread binding most of the 21st century’s terrorists together?
Seriously when di it become so god damn horrible to not couch every statement in bullshit PC double talk so as not to offend anyone anywhere for any reason.
Ever stop to think that part of a free sociecty is that people are allowed to be offended by the views and opinions of others? BEcause if not Laura, how long until your views and opinions are the ones that become untanable to scociety?
Timothy McVeigh, Terry Nichols, the Weathermen, the Symbionese Liberation Army, Scott Roeder, Shelley Shannon, Michael Griffin, Ted Kaczynski, and the list goes on. Terrorists are found in every nation and all religions.
Nobody is saying that people should be banned from offending anybody. That argument is not being made. By anybody here, at least. You can save yourself the effort of refuting this argument which is not being made.
If people should not say something just because it’s politically correct, then equally somebody should not avoid saying something just because it’s politically correct. Saying “black people are not intrinsically stupid from the moment of conception” is politically correct, but it also happens to be true. Saying “lots of terrorists are nut Muslims, and a WHOLE LOT of Muslims are not terrorists” is politically correct, but it also happens to be true.
You know why christianity is a shell of its former power and on average a force for good these days?
Because people finally had enough of the shit they were trying to pull and put an end to it. We put an end to witch burnings and the inquisition and burning scholars for daring to suggest the earth wasnt the center of all creation.
We have to do the same with islam, it has to be broken in the same way christianity was broken. And pretending it doesnt exist isnt going to make the problem go away
I haven’t intruded on this argument because y’all seem to have it under control, but I must point out one flaw here, Lujlp; the “we” who curbed the power of Christianity were Christians and people in majority-Christian cultures, not Buddhists or Hindus or pagans or atheists imposing such reform from outside. Change will come to Islam when the Muslims and people of majority-Muslim cultures reform it, and not before.
Ya beat me to it, Maggie. You even mentioned Buddhists, just like I was planing to.
I was going to say Jains instead of Hindus.
That is a fair enough point Maggie, unfortunatley we no longer live in a time where it takes years for an army to get from one place to another, or when a lone man could only kill his perceived enemies one at a time.
Nevertheless, human nature has not changed. “Reform” applied from outside by force is not true reform at all; it is social engineering and results in nothing but resentment even if it were morally defensible, which it isn’t.
There is a historical counter-example. State Shinto aka Bushido Shinto was destroyed by outside forces when MacArthur required, as part of the unconditional surrender terms, that Showa (Hirohito) renounce his godhood. But State Shinto was a creation of the Meiji Restoration as a means of resisting Western influences; in the 1890’s it became a fascist religion – preempting the later Italian and German manifestations – where schools were reformed to instill dedication to the state and it’s divine embodiment in the person of the Emperor.
What remains is either a polytheist (if one concentrates on origin myths or theogony) or an animist religion with spirits of various sorts inhabiting natural phenomena or specific places in a manner similar to but not as personified as the Greek nymphs. Most of the Japanese I met, with the exception of one Shinto Priest, were cultural Shinto rather than true believers and they conformed to the tradition that you are born and wed Shinto, but you die Buddhist by observing the rituals associated with those milestones.
Unlike State Shinto, which had its militaristic nature grafted on at a fairly late date, or Christianity, which began as an underdog religion, Islam has always been militaristic. It entertains no notion of separation of the mosque and secular power; in those cases where it has occurred it has clearly been a Western import, eg., Post-Ottoman Turkey, post WWII (briefly) Persia, Nasser’s Egypt and Baathist Iraq and Syria. In many cases, these were administrative continuances of colonial era governing structures, definitely not something that grew from within Islam.
Islam is a totalitarian religion. In principle, nothing is beyond the purview of the state/mosque complex. Conflicting power factions may limit the totality of control as a practical matter but there is no institutional bar to it. The Ottoman Empire at its height reflects this Islamic reality.
There are about a billion Muslims in the world. As soon as any western power, particularly the United States, makes an effort to “reform” the religion by force, they will all be against us, in the same way that Christians would unite against an attempt by a powerful foreign group (think Soviet Block, c. 1980) to “reform” Christianity. Unless one wishes to propose genocide on a scale never before attempted, with tens of millions of losses for the “reformers,” we need to drop this nonsense of forcefully reforming Islam. It simply isn’t doable at any price the western world is willing to pay. And of course there’s that little matter of genocide being evil in and of itself.
Islam will have to be reformed by Muslims themselves. Sorry if that bothers some people, or if it seems “politically correct” (can we please stop trying to make that the deciding factor of every issue?), or if it isn’t chest-thumpingly tough enough for some, or if it isn’t fast enough in our instant society. It’s the only option, or at least the only option not bearing a monstrous cost.
Sailor,
I’m not arguing for the forced reform of Islam. I opposed the idea of nation building and exporting democracy by force of arms a’la George Bush* for the same reason that I think that the colonial policies of the British Empire were a bad idea. The cost is too high for the country attempting to “take on the white man’s burden.” Colonialism abroad and socialism at home destroyed Britain. Acting as the world’s policeman or urban renewal czar or whatever coupled with the increasingly fascist state at home will destroy the US.
This is why I noted that whereas State Shinto was a late graft onto the religious structure, Islam has been militant from its very beginning. To force reform from the outside would require abject defeat of all practitioners of State Islam willing to engage us. It was only abject defeat of Germany and Japan that made their rebuilding in a Western image a possibility. George Bush thought he could do his nation-building on the cheap, putting money, supplies and infrastructure into the hands of the populace while the populace was still under the threat of insurgents. Essentially, the US has been transferring materiel to our enemies on the ground which is not the best strategy for winning a guerrilla conflict.
I don’t think that it is in our national interest to export democracy or reform Islam. I think our approach to State Islam should be two-fold, addressing foreign and domestic aspects.
Theft of western property or abuse of western citizens by State Islamists or their proxies should be retaliated against. We don’t put boots on the ground. We just destroy government function and infrastructure until they stop their bad behavior or the regime falls. And we don’t clean up the mess. We make it clear to the successor regime that similar behavior will precipitate similar outcomes.
For instance, the Somali pirates should be dealt with by destroying all vestiges of coastal infrastructure that support their piracy including preemptive destruction of any marine assets that they might use.
We don’t try to reform them. We just make it understood that the initiation of force by an Islamic state will be met with overwhelming retaliatory force.
Domestically, we don’t treat Muslims any different than any other sect. But if individuals who happen to be muslim engage in honor killings or female genital mutilation or rape or domestic assault or any other criminal activity, we prosecute them to the full extent of the law. After all, if we can prosecute child molestation in Yearning for Zion Ranch despite it masquerading behind a religious facade of spiritual marriage, we can certainly extend the same equality under the law to practitioners of Islam.
*This approach to the battlefield is the reason for the insane Rules of Engagement that are inflicted on our troops. These ROEs lead to enemy survival in the face of our tactical superiority – giving those survivors the chance to learn from their mistakes and counter our tactical doctrine leading to higher US casualties in future engagements. This is the same thing we did to the Japanese in Guadalcanal; we had horrific casualty rates learning the art of jungle warfare from the masters of the trade which we then turned to good effect against the Japanese from then on, reversing the casualty levels in subsequent battles.
No you didn’t, and I shouldn’t have written my reply as if you had. Sorry about that (chief).
I’ve gotten rather burned up over this, and I guess it showed, huh?
You know, to be clear I never said we need to force reform, I said we need to break it, and I think c andrews approch is the way to go. We get hit, we hit back ten times as hard with no regrad for cultural sensitvity and leave. No sticking around to clean up, no sticking around to draw out the process of revenge. Just retaliate and warn it will be even worse the next time.
The problem is noone want to be the ‘bad guy’ even when it comes to self defense.
I find the mental disconnect facinating when people will in one breath advocate the castration and murder of anyone who looks crosseyed at their kids, but struggles to explain how they and ‘we’ are collectivly at fault when some one tries to kill us over a relgious ideology
Sailor,
No worries on that. I can’t count the number of times I went off on a rhetorical tangent on a comment because it followed from what I was writing. Besides, your point was well taken. There would be a huge number of deaths required. And most people would shy away from that necessity in that particular solution regime.
I hope, however that Ahmadinejad never gets nukes or the muslim proxies around the world never acquire or use them. Because then I think that the calculus changes. And polities would be willing to inflict millions of deaths to stop them.
If it ever comes to that, then I think we would have no recourse but to exercise the Hirohito option. Completely secularize the aggressor states by rigorously removing all Islamic influences from the governing structures – like we did in Japan – private Shinto was allowed but State Shinto was forbidden – and in similar fashion to the de-nazification program in Germany after WWII.
I too hope it never comes to that. For one thing, there’s no Islamic Hirohito. No Islamic Pope. No one guy you can force to renounce his divinity, infallibility, messiahood, or whatever. You could destroy the Kaaba,but I doubt that would do it.
The spreading democratization now taking place in the Islamic world is really our best hope. Democracies (including republics and other wiggles) seldom fight each other, whatever the religion. I won’t say never, but seldom.
Getting the western world off the oil titty would help too. Except for Israel (and even there to an extent), every reason we care what they do over there and every reason they resent us comes back to oil.
It was written in their Koran, that all nations which had not acknowledged the Prophet were sinners, whom it was the right and duty of the faithful to plunder and enslave; and that every mussulman who was slain in this warfare was sure to go to paradise
That was said by the ambassador of Tripoli to Thomas Jefforson and John Adams (when they asked why a nation they had never attacked and had made no injury to) in 1785. SEVENTEEN EIGHTY FIVE.
How much oil were american corperations exporting from the middle east and africa in 1785? I cant seem to find a figure.
luljp,
I think that quote illustrates the on-going militancy of the religion and disproves the notion, floated by a number of opposing groups, (eg., Huffproletariat on one end and the Lew Rockwell types on the other) that Islam’s hostility to the west is a function of colonialism or multi-national corporations or whatever.
What I think Sailor Barsoom is saying that if we weren’t buying mideast oil, we wouldn’t be continuing to subsidize our enemies. Now since oil is fungible – that is, its origins and uses are indistinguishable once on the market, it is likely that they would still get their money, just not from US sources. The only way to significantly impact their oil profits economically is to exploit oils sources that have a lower extraction cost. This would put them at a disadvantage cost-wise. But our domestic energy policy precludes that possibility.
In fact, the devastation of the Abbasid Caliphate was the direct result of Islam’s xenophobia – when the Mongols sent 3 ambassadors to a regional governor of the Caliphate, he beheaded the muslim and shaved and humiliated the two mongols. In retaliation, Hulagu Khan invaded Mesopotamia (modern day Iraq), killed 80% of the population, destroyed all of the irrigation infrastructure and sacked Baghdad. Historians have adapted the line from Tacitus to describe his campaign. “He made a desert and called it peace.”
So what were they fighting over in 1785? Religion? There were Christians closer by to fight.
To get back to today, we have for decades now interfered in Mideast governments because of oil. There’s always going to be somebody, in any religion, who wants to kill and die for God(s). But to get a following they need to be able to say more than, “They… they’re not like us!” Yeah they’re not us. They’re also thousands of miles away; who gives a fuck?
But what if they’re not thousands of miles away? What if they have soldiers quartered on your religion’s sacred lands (bin Laden’s big gripe)? Remember all the hullabaloo over the “Ground Zero Mosque?” What if it had been the “Ground Zero Saudi Arabian Army Barracks?”
We say we’d like for Iran to have a western-style democratic-republic. Well they had one. They argued over how much power religion should have in their country, much like we do. WE put in the Shah, which led to the revolution, which led to the Iran hostage crisis, which taught the Islamic world that you can in fact stick it to America, for all our military might.
They don’t attack us just because we’re Christians (for one thing not all of us are and for another they don’t seem to give a damn about most of the other Christians around the world). “For Allah!” helps psych up the guys putting themselves at risk, but it isn’t the reason. They don’t hate us because we’re free, and they don’t hate us for our “immorality.” Why ain’t they bombing the hell out of the Japanese porn industry? Bunko Kanazawa is no more a Muslim than the Pope is (and they’re not bombing him, either). Maybe it’s because the Japanese porn industry isn’t screwing around with their governments, invading their countries,* killing their people, arming their enemies and yelling about how much better off the world would be without them.
* Japanese forces have been involved in the Iraq War, but with really tight rules of engagement. They shouldn’t be there at all; the Japanese Constitution forbids deploying troops outside the country.
Hi Sailor,
This lapse of protection by a European power led to the first American merchant shipping seized after the Treaty of Paris. On October 11, 1784, Moroccan pirates seized the brigantine Betsey.[2]
No, in 1785 the issue was piracy. It was the beginning of the conflict that led to the two Barbary wars – The reference in the Marine Hymn “to the shores of Tripoli” is in regard to these wars.
The envoy for the Barbary pirates invoked the Koran and the instructions of Allah when asked by the US why they waged war on a nation that had offered no injury to them.
HT luljp
It was written in their Koran, that all nations which had not acknowledged the Prophet were sinners, whom it was the right and duty of the faithful to plunder and enslave; and that every mussulman who was slain in this warfare was sure to go to paradise. He said, also, that the man who was the first to board a vessel had one slave over and above his share, and that when they sprang to the deck of an enemy’s ship, every sailor held a dagger in each hand and a third in his mouth; which usually struck such terror into the foe that they cried out for quarter at once. [12]
So we paid tribute amounting to 20% of the national government’s receipts for about 20 years until we built a navy capable of dealing with the piracy, thus confirming Will Roger’s view that “Diplomacy is the art of saying ‘Nice doggie’ until you can find a rock.”
Thank you.
So it really didn’t have squat to do with religion. It had to do with stealing. Then when called on it, they tried to get all holy, even though they hadn’t attacked out of faith, but out of greed.
I think that niqab would be illegal here in the US. Many municipalities, and states, have “mask laws” forbidding adults to go masked other than at Halloween or Mardi Gras. These laws were originally aimed at the 1920s Ku Klux Klan, but they’re still on the books.
well, i have to mostly agree with maggie. Yes i think the women who wear the covering and go for all the Islam law are foolish. But IMHO most religions are. However, we must be tolerant of people we don`t agree with. French law for freedom should apply to all. However, Muslims must obey the laws that apply freedom to all. But i must also say i understand the concerns of “seeing a terrosist” behind ever turn. It is no doubt a big conversation and needs to be held with reason and a calm mind.
This…phobia that seems to have gripped Americans regarding Islam is exceptionally disturbing to this atheist. Some of the comments on this post are ridiculous.
Islam will not cause nations to fall. Islam is 600 years younger than Christianity. Look at where the faiths are in relativity to each other. Islam is growing up much faster than Christianity did because of the freedom of information that exists today.
France should realize this. America should recognize this. Or am I also becoming a badge wearing member of the “enlightenment police”.
Christians, particularly American christians, need to pay attention to their actions and words. Too often they become the Christian Taliban instead of Americans who happen to be Christian (which is the way I always thought it was supposed to work).
The French have a different dynamic, all European countries do. They do have a national identity based upon those that have family ties that run back centuries. Anyone not French by generations is viewed as an outsider. Last time I checked America should not be thinking this same way. It’s foolish and forgets what America represents.
I do not fear Islam. I put it in the category of other shit that someone else wants me to fear but isn’t the threat they imagine. It shares company with: Avian flu, SARS, Ebola, Satanic cults, and killer bees. All are actual existing things (well, satanic cults are still in doubt) but in reality we don’t have to fear them, just know they are out there and take proper precautions.
I’ve known a few muslims, not many. But all have been good people, whom I trust no more or less than anyone else, in general. And it bothers me to know there are Americans who would see harm come to them for no cause more than the deity they worship. I know this reaction mostly comes from fear, but there is an undeniable hint of racism and religious intolerance as well.
But, there again is my tendency to “enlightenment policing” to come out. So I think I’m as bad as everyone else in this regard. I think the facts lead me to my conclusions, but I suspect I’m as fooled by my own bullshit as everyone else is.
Dear kaiju0, thank you and bless you! I’ve watched in horror as this “Christian Taliban” (a great name for them!) has grown since 9/11 in the US. Horrible and evil! But, there’s also many Christians fighting it. I’ve also known few Muslims in my life, but the 1’s I’ve met are outstanding people who don’t fit these ###*** stereotypes at ALL. 1 of them I met at my current job and this lady is a wonderful friend to many and does a lot of charity work and is also an activist in other areas. She’s very discreet about her charity work which I love! Thank you again for speaking up against the fear and lies!
I think we have all wandered far from the points I think that Maggie was trying to make. That government too often thinks it knows better than the people; and that too often people either cant speak up for themselves, or dony organize sufficiently to make an impact.
Exactly. I honestly wasn’t trying to say anything about religions or immigration, but merely to point out that how a woman dresses is at least as personal an issue as whom she chooses to go to bed with and for what reason, and any government which thinks it has the right to regulate the one will probably end up trying to regulate the other. The only way to stop it is to prevent governments from regulating ANY personal decisions in the first place.
What hits me as slightly ironic, is that the clothing choice that started the whole discussion isnt really a choice at all when it comes right down to it. It is actually just pressure to conform to a way of behaving that is based on religious law instead of civil law.
We are extremely lucky to live in the US, because we have many more choices than people who come from other countries. If my child wants to be catholic, muslim, protestant, wiccan, or whatever, they can choose. For most if not all who come from other countries, they really dont have the ability to choose.
Their country’s enlightenment police wont let them.
I beg to differ. That’s certainly true in their own countries, but in France it’s the opposite; the overwhelming social pressure is to conform to bare-facedness, and if you read the article you’ll see that many of the women who have been arrested are the only ones in their families who wear the niqab.
One could make the argument that as a member of a minority group the pressure put forth by a close knit community to conform to the comunity would outeigh the pressure of the scociety at large.
Gypsys make a good exaple of that argument, the people on the jersy shore make another
My cousin’s wife always covers her hair. I’m told she is the only member of her family, aside from a couple of older ones, to do so. Her family is from Indonesia, a country where probably the majority of women do not cover themselves (it varies quite a bit from one island to another, I’m told), but she was born in the US and is completely American in her behaviour. And while she is devout, she’s never shown any sign of fanaticism as far as I know, and I’m told nobody in her family has ever objected to her non-Muslim husband.
I know a White American Muslim woman who always covers her hair, though not her face. She is from a Christian background, and she converted to Islam and married a Thai Muslim and she works as a Thai interpreter. There is obviously no pressure from her at least nominally Christian family to cover her hair; she does it of her own free will, even at the cost of being considered a weirdo by other Americans.
Whenever I drive my convertible I hold my hair back in a kerchief, and if I’m just running briefly into someplace like a store I don’t always bother to remove it. In such circumstances I have noticed that Muslim ladies I meet always smile at me, whereas they don’t usually do so when my hair is uncovered. I don’t think they mistake me for a believer, but rather that they approve of what they perceive as my modesty.
I dont care who you are, thats ironic right thar!
😀
lujlp, I am answering your post from October 4, 2011 at 2:42 am, here, because we apparently reached the maximum number of nested replies.
You are trying to change the terms of the debate. I never advocated or defended sharia law. What I defended was freedom of religion to worship as people please as long as they do not engage in coercion. This discussion started because you made a statement against Muslims praying in public – not against Sharia law. I defend the right of ANYONE to pray in public regardless of how you or anyone else feels about their religion.
Maintaining freedom of religion does NOT depend on suppressing the free expression of religion. That is the fundamental point you and I disagree on. Freedom of religion REQUIRES the free expression of ANY religion.
As for pharmacists refusing to fill birth control and morning after pill subscriptions, pharmacists who work in the private sector have no obligation to fill ANY prescription if they don’t want to. It’s up to the employer to decide whether they want to keep employing that pharmacist.
Either you missed my point or I failed to make it clear.
I understand you are advocationg freedom of religion. It is my opinion that only by keeping religious power below the level of secular law is that possible.
Should a religion ever gain enough power to superceed and replace secular law freedom of any other religion then the one in power would fade pretty quick.
Now with muslims in western europe calling for the suspension of the secular laws of their respective countries and an institution of “sharia law zones” in some heavilly populated neihborhoods I cant really blame the french government for trying to do something.
I do not think this law is a good idea. Let me be clear on that, and let me also be clear the reason I think it is a bad law is not becuase I disagree with the sentiment, but becuase any ‘persecuted’ minority is instinctivly going to dig in their heels and double down on their culture.
But given a large minority of the muslim population IS advocating an intitution of a theocracy over the secular government I dont blame the frech for trying to do something about it.
As for a free expression of any religion I doubt you’d be cool with human sacrifce.
And as for pharmicists I notice not one ever refused to give out life saving anti biotics under ethical objections
lujlp wrote: “As for a free expression of any religion I doubt you’d be cool with human sacrifce.”
In a previous comment, I wrote: …freedom of religion, freedom to express one’s religious beliefs in any non-coercive way one chooses
This obvious precludes human sacrifice. Are you just pretending you don’t understand that?
If France’s Muslim population is demanding Sharia law, then the solution is not to prohibit free expression of religious beliefs; the solution is to curb or altogether end Muslim immigration.
And I agree, as I said I think this law is a bad idea. But given the situation I cant blame the fench for trying to do something.
Also the argument could be made that the full body coverings are coercive.
And what is your take on human sacrifice if the sacrifice is a willing participant?
lujlp, human sacrifice of a willing participant is so rare a circumstance that it in practical terms it’s irrelevant.
I support assisted suicide only for the terminally ill who have less than six months left to live, and only assisted by a medical professional, in the most painless way possible, in privacy.
Now PLEASE don’t ask me how I feel about religious human sacrifice of a terminally ill person performed by a doctor. Your scenarios are getting progressively so specialized and rare that they’re irrelevant.
Not really, in many cultures which practiced human sacrifice it was an honor to be the one chosen for death.
Why are the immigrant women who wear the niqab in France? They can wear the niqab in their home country, correct? If they feel that strongly about it, why not go back to their home country?
But that isn’t what this whole argurment against the French law banning the niqab is about. The French (and every other Western country) should have restricted immigration from Muslim countries, but didn’t. This law is an attempt to end-run around leftist policies.
There has been unbridled immigration of third-worlders without the demand of assimilation into the host country. No country survives that over time. Y’all can discuss the theoretical over lattes at Starbucks, but the real world doesn’t work like that.
Leftist policies. Third-worlders not assimilating. LATTES!!
You forgot tie-dye, love beads, and limousines.
Tie-dye and love beads, mercifully, were passé in the early 80’s. I am astonished that bell-bottoms, afros and cornrows have made a comeback. And, apparently, patchouli is like the undead…
Allow me some more clichés. I learned, as an insufferable youth, when living in a country I was not born in, one should learn the host country’s language, obey the host country’s laws and not p!ss off the neighbors. This would ensure a more pleasant stay. You wanna fight City Hall? Fine. When City Hall pushes back, complaining as if it’s unexpected or unfair seems callow. Robert’s Rules of Order do not apply.
And, just to repeat myself, they can wear the niqab or hijab in their home countries. And yet, they emigrated to Western countries. What did they think would happen when they didn’t learn the host country’s language, didn’t respect the host country’s laws and p!ssed off the neighbors? Sic vita est (my Latin is rusty).
They can wear it HERE. They can wear it in France if France will stop playing to the xenophobe vote.
Wear a three-piece suit, wear a kimono, wear a hijab, wear jeans and a T-shirt, wear a sari, wear a prom dress. Wear a freaking plug suit, if you think you’ve got the figure for it. Wear whatever the hell you want to wear, and why should anybody else give a damn? Why is it anybody else’s business? You don’t like it, don’t look.
And for the record, that goes for droopy pants, goth outfits, crop tops, and whatever other weird thing somebody decides is fashionable. My generation came of age in parachute pants; we don’t have room to condemn.
No. That isn’t the way the world works. And it is not the way the world _will_ work, presently. You may want to wear chaps, and nothing else, to your job, but it ain’t gonna happen. Actions _always_ have consequences.
I notice you added “to your job.” You probably wouldn’t get away with parachute pants at work either.
So leave that out and yeah, it is like that. There are a few parts of your body you’re not allowed to show (and the things I listed don’t show them), but mostly, wear what you like.
I suppose “have a nice day” could be called a talking point. So? They’re going after the xenophobe vote. Sorry if it bothers you that I point this out.
I suppose I wasn’t clear before. You can wear what you like, wherever you like. But your attire is gonna cause others to judge you, for good or for ill, and whether you like it or not. Chaps at work? You may like them, but your boss is gonna limit your tenure there. Hijab in a supermarket? People are make judgements about the woman wearing it. That “xenophobe vote” being pandered to didn’t occur in a vacuum.
The subject at hand isn’t about somebody being “judged” by members of the general public for what she wears, nor is it about her boss telling her it doesn’t conform to the company’s dress code. The subject is people being arrested for wearing something the government has decided they don’t want people to be wearing, because such a crack-down will win votes from people who don’t like being reminded that not everybody is like them.
This whole blog isn’t about members of the general public not liking prostitutes, but about prostitution being defined as a crime.
I have been lurking for a while. I understand the blog.
This law passing in France isn’t remotely analogous to outlawing prostitution, in my opinion. Outlawing prostitution was/is an attempt, by women, not men, to control the volatile consequence of female sexuality. Shorthand: men are cheap, women are dear (e.g. men compete for the attentions of women. See Nature). Prostitution circumvents the competition by allowing “pay for play.”
Surely you have seen the photos and youtube vids of car-b-ques in specific areas of France. The hijab is a harbinger of car-b-que. The hijab wasn’t even around before Jimmy Carter was president. So, now, when one sees a hijab, one can make some assumptions about what will happen in the future. And it isn’t only the xenophobe vote making those assumptions. If it was, the law likely would not have been passed.
It’s a matter of a group of lawmakers saying, “I don’t like that; it expresses a faith I don’t agree with, therefore you can’t wear it.”
It’s a way to make it a little less distressingly obvious that Muslims exist. It’s a reflection of the idea that freedom is a great thing, unless of course somebody wants to be free to do something the powers that be don’t like. It’s a case of “You are free to do as you’re told.”
And it’s amazing what can be passed by appealing to fear. See P.A.T.R.I.O.T. Act, sex offender registries, etc.
And you do realize “xenophobe vote” is a talking point, too?
{It’s a matter of a group of lawmakers saying, “I don’t like that; it expresses a faith I don’t agree with, therefore you can’t wear it.”}
So, you ignore my point about the harbinger of car-b-que. And you ignore that lawmakers do nothing in a vacuum. I think, in the future, I will ignore your arguments from now on. You argue like a freshman college student, all platitudes and no logic.
I ignore the “harbinger” because it is basic fear-mongering, and because freedom of expression is not to be nerfed on the grounds that the expression might inspire bad people to do bad things. If that were the case, pornography could be banned until it was absolutely proven (which it never would be because you can’t prove a future negative) that nobody would ever be inspired by it to rape, and horror movies could be banned until it were absolutely proven (which it never would be for the same reason) that nobody would ever be inspired by one to murder.
I’m sorry that the fact that I actually believe in freedom seems immature to you. You may, of course, ignore me as much as you like. That’s your freedom. May no one ever take it away from you.
I apologize for the previous snark. In my zeal, I forgot C.S. Lewis’ admonition to be polite when arguing with someone with whom I disagree.
It is not fear-mongering to recognize and say that seeing a lot of women wearing hijab in a Western country is a harbinger of future problems. And, the hijab is not a catalyst, as you imply, but an indicator of future trouble. You don’t have to take my word for it; the proof was the news reports out of France during the previous 5 years.
Also, I think it is actually freedom from consequence that you are advocating. You want to be free to do anything you wish, wear anything you wish, ingest anything you wish, etc? You already _are_ free to do anything you want. But there will be consequences for _every_ act, regardless of your apparent wish. The consequence may be running afoul of the law, running afoul of public opinion or running afoul of the laws of physics. But there is going to be a consequence, come hell or high water.
Cool. I’ll try to be civil also, for all that I disagree with you on some things.
And as long as I’m talking about disagreeing…
I feel that the idea that people are free to do whatever they want, but they may run afoul of the law, is rather silly. By that standard, Maggie was always free to practice prostitution. For that matter, Willy Sutton was always free to rob banks and Americans never lost the freedom to make, buy and sell liquor, no not even during Prohibition.
It’s the sort of statement that’s sorta-kinda true, if you define your terms just right, but it’s also meaningless.
I’m not asking to be free from things like gravity. But as long as what I do doesn’t harm others, then I should indeed be free from running afoul of man’s law. If I want to run around bonking people over the head with a hammer while screaming “For the glory of Thor!” well no, I shouldn’t be free to do that. If I want to wear a necklace with a little hammer-shaped pendant, and a T-shirt reading “For the glory of Thor!” then I should indeed be free from any legal consequences. Whether anybody else likes Thor or not.
In this example, I’m not free from the laws of physics (that T-shirt won’t keep me any warmer in the winter than will one without mention of the God of Thunder), and I’m not free from the fact that many people will disapprove of my open paganism. But yes, I should be free from arrest, fines, and other criminal consequences of wearing something that makes it harder for people to pretend Thorans aren’t around.
I _don’t_ have to define terms “just so,” to say you are free to do anything you want. You _are_ free to do anything. But you always have to decide if the consequence is worth the doing. Nothing silly or meaningless about that.
That is why I think you are aiming for freedom from consequence. You wanna wear your Glorious Thor t-shirt and pendant, go right ahead. But if there is a law against it, you can complain all you want about how unfair it is, but you decided, when you put them on, to take the consequence. Can’t have your cake and eat it at the same time.
Now, the law passed against the hijab was a reaction. I doubt there were pagans burning up cars in France; otherwise, there would have been a similar law passed against symbols of paganism. Personally, I think the French should be deporting everyone in those car-b-que districts back to the country of origin. And they should not allow immigration from any of those countries again. But they won’t because of political correctness. So they will try to control what they see as the canary in the coal mine.
And we’re back to my original argument. Those women can wear the niqab and hijab in their countries of origin. The emigrated to France for a reason; their countries of origin were less-than-desirable. If you learn the host language, obey the host laws, and don’t p!ss off the neighbors, that goes a long way to living comfortably in someone else’s country.
First off, if you immigrate to a country, then you’re not “in someone else’s country,” you’re in your country. And you’re not just “complaining about how unfair it is,” you’re fighting religious bigotry and discrimination. As a part of that, you need to not only speak out, you may even have to take that risk of going to jail or paying a fine. But you’re taking that risk to change things.
You seem to be saying, “change or go home or enjoy your cell, but don’t speak out and don’t try to fight for your rights.”
If that isn’t it, I need some clarification.
On a related note (and to get back to the main thrust of this blog): should prostitutes just quit sex work or docilely accept their arrests and fines, incarcerations, etc? After all, prostitution is against the law. Are they just “complaining about how unfair it is?”
The clarification is this: when you leave your home country to live, permanently, in another country which you are gonna make your _new_ home country, you need to assimilate. Learn the language, learn the laws, don’t p!ss off the neighbors. Also regarding those immigrants, it’s not _their_ country; it is the country of the people already there. The burden of proof is on the emigre’ to show he has assimilated, not the people already there to accept without proof. And, yeah, I am saying that if you don’t change to adapt to the new country, where you _chose_ to live, GTFO.
If you don’t learn the host language and demand, instead, that the host country make everything available in _your_ language, demand that the host country allow you to observe your previous country’s customs but not the host’s, the politicians may pander to you but the neighbors are going to push back after a while. We are seeing that push-back everywhere. I can say that with certainty, because _I_ don’t normally argue on blogs.
Prostitution is a separate issue from this one. The laws prohibiting it are well-known. The mores denigrating it are also ingrained in the current (US) culture. But, I have no problem with prostitutes assembling for redress of grievances. But until the laws are changed, you better be ready to accept the consequences of disobeying them, whether you agree with them or not.
Note – when I say “prostitutes,” I am not including girls who were kidnapped into the sex trade; I believe they are victims and should be rescued.
We agree that anyone actually kidnapped into prostitution should be rescued. It’s rare, very rare, but if and when it does happen, then yes, they should be rescued and the kidnapper put away for a very long time.
What about Muslims born in France? Can they wear religiously traditional dress?
The comparison with demanding that everything be made available in your language is invalid. A valid comparison would be the immigrants demanding that native-born French women cover. Covering themselves is not the same thing. The government is being an ass, and should stop.
You know, I am starting to believe I was correct in my intemperate previous judgement. Do you understand what assimilate means, relating to immigration? It means to drop any vestige of the country you came from and take on the customs and vestiges of the country which has allowed you to enter. If you don’t want to follow the customs of the host country, GTFO.
I can’t speak for France, but here in the States, NOBODY has done that. The Irish kept whiskey and St. Patrick, the Germans kept sauerkraut and tennenbaum, the Japanese kept sushi and Buddha, the Italians kept pasta and Catholicism, and so on.
Assimilation seems to mean you learn the language, and you try to get a job and you pay your taxes. It doesn’t mean you try to pretend that you aren’t of Irish ancestry, or German, or Japanese, or Italian. Or Arabic. It doesn’t mean that you renounce, or pretend to renounce, Anglicism, Lutheranism, Buddhism, Catholicism, or Islam.
That kind of “assimilation” is for the Borg, not for countries which claim to be free.
The Irish kept whiskey in their homes and taverns, but did not demand that their customs took precedence over American laws and customs.
The Japanese kept sushi and Buddha in their homes and restaurants, but did not demand that their customs took precedence over American laws and customs.
The Italians kept pasta and Catholicism in their homes and restaurants, but did not demand that their customs took precedence over American laws and customs.
The immigrant muslims are demanding that their customs take precedence over American laws and customs. You may think that is cool. I don’t, because I see the countries they left to come here.
The prevalence of hyphenated-American is a recent development. It is a balkanization of the country that started when I was a kid. Before that, you were either an American or a visitor. Theodore Roosevelt was correct.
I am done arguing with you on this. I am no longer gonna try to convince you because you won’t be.
That’s probably for the best. As things stand now, I think you’re wrong, and you think I’m wrong. It doesn’t look like either of us is going to change the other’s mind.
I’m sure there are things we would agree on, and I look forward to discovering what those things are.
That law was completely unnecessary, since there was already a law that forbids hiding one’s face in public places, excluding bikers’ helmets and carnival masks (the latter only during carnival, I believe). That law is still in place, by the way. I’m not sure how old it is, but It was passed long before this one.